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[QUOTE]Originally posted by Myra Wysinger: [QB] [b]Shrine Stands of King Natakamini and Kandake Amanitore[/b] Sandstone; H. 116, W. 84 cm, Th. 84 cm From Wad Ban Naga Preuliische Agypten-Expedition, 1844 Meroitic, A.D. 0-20 Berlin, Agyptisches Museum und Papyrussammlung [b]Bilingual Text[/b] [IMG]http://www.homestead.com/wysinger/nat.jpg[/IMG] [IMG]http://www.homestead.com/wysinger/aman6.jpg[/IMG] The Kushite rulers King Natakamani and Kandake Amanitore constructed important temples throughout the kingdom. They erected one such building, similar in ground plan and size to the Amun Temple at Naga, in one of the largest city centers of the "island" of Meroe, in the vicinity of the present-day Wad Ban Naga. In 1844, the Prussian expedition discovered three stands for divine barks or shrines there, of which the largest was brought through the authority of Muhammad Ali to Berlin. The two others disappeared long ago. On the two larger stands, the decoration and inscriptions in Egyptian, used one last time after a long interval, bear close similarity to pieces from contemporary Egypt (that is, the early Roman Period), particularly at Philae. The Egyptian temple is a model of the universe whose heavenly region is inhabited by the god. The divine image rests in a naos or divine bark on a stand which thus takes the form of a temple. Beneath a torus molding and cavetto cornice, adorned on one side with a winged sun-disk delineating a gateway, the star-filled heavens are shown on all four sides being "supported" by four individuals. Two opposite sides show two of the deities of the four cardinal points, holding up the heavens according to mythic imagery; they are Tawyt ("Bearer") for the north and Ahayt ("Midday") for the south. The horizontal captions describe the scene: "The heavens are lifted up by me for the mistress of the earth. Through me her place is established in greater (heavenly) distance than that of the one who bore her; may she shine in it in her bark like the moon who travels in his bark." "The heavens are lifted up by me for Isis, who grants life. Through me her place is established in greater (heavenly) distance than that of the one who raised her; may she shine in her chapel like the sun in his night-bark." In place of the other two cardinal point deities are King Natakamani and Kandake Amanitore. Among the well-established duties of the king was the maintenance of the temple as insurance of cosmic order. This is signified by the "lifting" of the heavens, as is the hope that the deity might inhabit its cult image in the temple. Thus the inscriptions accompanying Natakamani and Amanitore read: "Stay, stay on the great throne, Isis, mistress of the Underworld, like the living sun-disk in the horizon, in that you let your son Natakamani remain on his throne." "Stay, stay on the great throne, Isis, mistress of the Underworld, as does the moon that grows like an egg in traversing heaven. May it give life to your daughter, Amanitore." The bark stand is also of importance for the decipherment of the Meroitic script. Beside the heads of the two rulers, their throne names are written according to Egyptian custom, while their birth names appear in Meroitic hieroglyphs. The latter also appear, this time in Egyptian hieroglyphs, in the caption texts; the object is thus truly bilingual. Photo and text from the book [i]Sudan: Ancient Kingdoms of the Nile,[/i] Dietrich Wildung, 1997, p. 256 [/QB][/QUOTE]
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